PICKIN’ ON THE BIG TEN: SPECIAL SEASON PREVIEW EDITION

Welcome to the Internet’s greatest sarcastic football prediction column, the award-winning Pickin’ on the Big Ten. The 2003 college football season starts one month from today, so it’s time to start coughing up these chicken scratchings again as we near yet another disappointing season for the Big Ten.

I say “disappointing” because there’s no way any Big Ten teams will contend for the national title this year, for reason we shall discuss anon. But before we look forward, let us look back on the season that was:

I guess Ohio State won some sort of survey or something. They keep calling it a “national title” but I can’t find any mention of a Division 1A football champion anywhere on the NCAA’s website. I think they’re just making it up to distract attention from Maurice Clarett and his continuing struggle against reality. The Big Ten went 5-2 in bowls last season, and wouldn’t you know it, my team was 1 of the 2. Still, the SEC went 3-3 in bowl games last year, exactly equaling their in-conference record against each other. Some “elite” conference they are if they can’t do any better than .500 against each other! And the Pac 10, as expected, went 2-5 once they had to start playing real teams.

So you can see there’s hardly anywhere to go but down for the Big Ten this season. Some doofus school like Florida or Boston College will probably go all the way undefeated and wind up running off with the #1 ranking in the Zogby Poll or Top 50 College Football Fan Sites.com or something equally meaningless. Personally, I say instead of watching Big Ten football this season, you just settle back, tune in PBS, and watch that dead guy with the Afro who paints “happy little trees.” But, since I know you won’t listen, I can give you a thousand words on Black Sabbath . . . er, the Big Ten in 2003.
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SLAIN BY BLISS

As per a reader’s request, here are ten bands whose careers were absolutely ended by Nirvana. I’m departing from my usual M.O. and listing these bands in ascending rather than descending order.

(For the record, “Smells like Teen Spirit” was released at the same time as the Nevermind album: Sept. 24, 1991. Nevermind hit the top of the Billboard charts on January 11, 1992. And these are ten bands whose careers were effectively over when it did.)

1. Guns N’ Roses. After absolutely owning the rock world in the late 80s, Gn’R released their epic but flawed 2-disc set Use Your Illusion the same month as Nevermind. The single “November Rain,” boosted by an old-school video, did well (it peaked at #3) and helped move the albums up the charts. But the Gunners never got above #55 on the Hot 100 again. Their next album was a quick punk-rock cash-in called The Spaghetti Incident?. It hit #4, and then everything dried up. This is not unlike the Beatles vanishing from the charts after the Rolling Stones showed up. It’s too soon to close the door on Gn’R–they may yet release Chinese Democracy, although I doubt it–but of all the careers Nirvana ended, none was more dramatic than this.

2. Wilson Phillips. I’ll pause a moment while you pick your jaw up from the floor. I’m serious. Three #1 hits in 1990-91, a couple minor successes in early 1992, then absolutely ding-dong nothing. A lot of that was due to weak material, but you can’t rule out the fact that Nirvana turned a significant portion of Wilson Phillips’ audience (college-age females) on to rock.

3. Bryan Adams. Yes, I know he had several hits in the 90s–with schmaltzy ballads, most of which were commissioned for movie soundtracks. Bear in mind that at one time, he was considered a rock artist. Maybe he just sold out, I don’t know, but I do know that “Smells Like Teen Spirit” described infinitely more Gen-X childhoods than “Kids Wanna Rock” or “Summer of ‘69″. (By the way, Bryan Adams was eight years old in the summer of ‘69, so throw away any thoughts of that song being autobiographical.)

4. Warrant. Another band rendered instantly old by Nirvana. Managed to hit #83 on the Hot 100 with a cover of “We Will Rock You” in ‘92; never saw any kind of charts again, except when visiting the eye doctor.

5. Damn Yankees. Ted Nugent’s hair-metal supergroup hit #3 with “High Enough” in ‘91; fizzled out completely by ‘93.

6. Van Halen. Stop it. It’s true. Their albums sold well, but their radio play vanished as rock stations began to embrace the “alternative” sound. The haven’t seen the Hot 100 since 1995; their last appearance in the top 10 (with the reprehensible “When It’s Love”) came in 1988. Numbers don’t lie.

7. Black Crowes. Oh, they kept releasing albums all through the 90s; it’s just that, after 1992, nobody really bought them, and the Crowes lost their status as the Next Big Thing. And in case you’re wondering, they never had a top 20 hit except on the irrelevant Mainstream Rock chart.

8. Midnight Oil. It wouldn’t be fair to name hair bands all day, even though they’re the ones who lost the most to Nirvana. Midnight Oil still had some Modern Rock hits in the mid-90s, but for the most part, Nirvana also ended their (US) career.

9. Concrete Blonde. Spare me your comments about the Cure–this is what “alternative” music meant to the mainstream in 1990. Concrete Blonde lost their fringe appeal, which was about the only appeal they had, so by 1995, they weren’t even a band anymore. More’s the pity.

10. The Pixies. Irony–the band Nirvana was most often compared to wound up being a victim of their doppelgangers’ success. Things were already coming apart by the time Nevermind was released; however, the Pixies went on hiatus after opening on U2’s 1992 Zoo TV tour and never returned.

A SIMPLE EXPERIMENT

Try this:

1. Go to your local Starbucks. (Don’t worry, if there isn’t one there yet, there will be soon.)

2. Purchase the beverage of your choice, maybe a little nosh if you’re so inclined.

3. Find a comfortable seat.

4. Whilst consuming your beverage and/or food, start tapping your foot along with the music.

5. Count how many songs go by that are exactly the same tempo.

6. See if you can beat my personal record, which is 11 songs in a row at about 114 beats per minute, set this morning at the Starbucks in West Bend, WI.

7. Ponder just how many songs James Taylor intends to write about going back to North Carolina.

8. And why he doesn’t just shut up and move there, already.

IT CAN’T ALL BE GOOD

Dylan Wilbanks has thrown down the gauntlet and called me out by name, essentially daring me to outdo his list of the 10 worst songs of the last 25 years.

You don’t tug on Superman’s cape, etc., etc. Read ‘em and weep, sucker.

10. Baltimora–”Tarzan Boy”: Insipid dance music, based on the worst imitation of Tarzan’s yell ever attempted. Made all the worse by appearing on the soundtracks to Beverly Hills Ninja and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III. Somewhere out there, I hope someone is organizing the Baltimora Cultural Indemnification Institute.

9. Mike + The Mechanics–”Living Years”: This song gave Paul Carrack his nine squajillionth chart hit, which is pretty amazing for a song without a single original idea in it anywhere. This was Mike Rutherford’s attempt to make a Big Statement To His Generation about the futility of intergeneration squabbling, but it failed. Say it loud, say it clear/You can listen as well as you hear. Fine, but from the context of the song, it sounds like the narrator needs to learn to listen as well as he speaks. An abomination.

8. Bryan White–”Someone Else’s Star”: Post-Garth country music is just too easy of a target. If this was a top-100 list, you could bet that Shania Twain would be on it at least five times. But most of it is just too derivative and forgettable to be truly bad–vis-a-vis this discussion about bad movies. But that doesn’t apply here”Someone Else’s Star” is truly inspired and deeply pitiful. The lyrics concern an unlucky gent who thinks the world has it in for him because other people are in relationships, and he’s not. Can you say solipsism, boys and girls? And don’t worry; the music is every bit as bathetic as the lyrics. I’m also giving White an extra measure of blame because of this song, which unleashed a flood of simpering tunes about gradeschool crushes and newborn babies. Even George Strait got swept up in it. There’s just no forgiving something like that.

7. Billy Joel–”We Didn’t Start The Fire”: “Here’s a song about everything bad that’s happened since I was born. By the way, in case the title of the song doesn’t convince you, my generation and I absolutely refuse to be held responsible for any of this stuff.” I was in high school when this song came out. Yes, we had to learn about every last thing mentioned in the lyrics. And no, fifteen years is not too long to be bitter about a high-school history assignment.

6. Neil Diamond–”Heartlight”: Probably the worst song inspired by, but not commissioned for, a major motion picture. Oh, you thought it was in the movie? Poor, pitiful fool.

5. Don Johnson–”Heartbeat”: No offense, Dylan, but this song was infinitely worse than Patrick Swayze’s. And I’m not saying that just because my brother’s class picked “She’s Like The Wind” as their class song. No, this is worse, because, unlike Swayze’s song, this one wasn’t used in a movie. This was simply a souvenir of the Johnson/Streisand romance. The video was wack, too.

4. LFO–”Summer Girls”: Whoring yourself out to a company that isn’t even paying you = one-hit-wonder status guaranteed. As if their lyrical abilities weren’t going to be enough.

3. Alanis Morissette–”Unsent”:A supposedly-good songwriter pens a bunch of discombobulated lyrics about the men in her life, then writes tortured, meterless music to accompany them. And since when is “muchly” a word, anyway?

2. Starship–”We Built This City”: From “White Rabbit” to this. I don’t know what’s the worst thing about this song: that greasy-tongued DJ spouting forth right in the middle, or these lyrics designed to peg your irony meter: Someone’s always playing corporation games/Who cares, they’re always changing corporation names. Bear in mind that Starship was this band’s third name and, if you don’t count Grace Slick (which you shouldn’t), the band had exactly zero original members left in it. Mickey Thomas shoulda stayed with Elvin Bishop.

1. Wham!–”Careless Whisper”: You name it, this song has got it. Simpering Miami Vice saxophone, Manilow-like musical grandeur, and best of all, the most bladder-busting lyrical couplet of all time: I’m never gonna dance again/Guilty feet have got no rhythm. While Dylan’s choice of Kenny G’s “Songbird” was inspired, it’s also too bland and anonymous to inspire the Lovecraftian terror that wells up in my mind whenever I fear that “Careless Whisper” is about to come on the radio. That, and as Kenny G songs go, “Silhouette” was worse; it was so sticky-sweet, the American Diabetes Association actually advised people against listening to more than 30 seconds of it.

Oh, I could go on forever, but why?

DEEP PHILOSOPHICAL QUESTION

Sure, I say I’m backing off, then my wife goes to bed early and there’s nothing good on TV.

Anyway, I got to thinking about bad movies. And I realized that there’s two different kinds of them. (There’s probably more than two kinds, but if you disagree, start your own blog.) There’s the kind that just flat out sucks from beginning to end–the performances are bad, the plot wouldn’t captivate a 3-year-old, it’s filmed poorly, or it’s got the words Police Academy or Kickboxer in the title. And you walk away from such films with a deeply bitter taste in your mouth, because you know you’ll never get that two hours of your life back. That’s how I felt when I saw this, this (which even my wife thought stunk out loud), this (KEANU REEVES??!!?), and (just to prove I’m not only biased against ckick flicks) this, which may be the worst movie I’ve ever seen. (Although I sure hated this, too, which also featured Keanu Reeves.)

I say “may be” because there’s a second category of bad: a movie which you know is a total stinkpot, but it’s so transcendently bad you begin to be entertained by its badness. Here I’m specifically thinking of Big Man On Campus, a 1989 retelling of The Hunchback of Notre Dame set at UCLA. How bad is it?
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A BLOGGER’S JOY

It’s a fine day. I’m an uncle for the first time. My niece, Claire Elise, was born this morning in Kansas City to my brother and sister-in-law.

ROAD SONGS, PART III

Tonight: the biggest modern-rock hit of the 90s, Stone Temple Pilots’ “Interstate Love Song.” The lyrics may mention trains, but the song has the unmistakable, desultory feel of leaving a truck stop on an unbearably hot August day.

This was as 70s-decadent as STP ever got. Beneath their alterna-bluster, they’re a phenomenally talented band, more prone to jazz chords than power chords. They’ve always been a favorite band of mine, and even though I’m lukewarm to this song, I felt I had to include it. The lyrics are typically cryptic, and you can examine them for yourself if you . . .
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I DON’T SHOOT FISH IN A BARREL, THAT’S WHY

A reader wonders why I haven’t commented on Pat Robertson’s veiled spiritual death threat to three Supreme Court justices. It’s real simple: Pat Robertson is a “minister of the Gospel” in the same sense that I am a “ballerina of the Bolshoi.” He is a political muckabout and wannabe kingmaker clothed–barely–under the guise of Christianity. And I don’t think he’s going to get an Oral Roberts-type deus ex machina ending, either. Just like he once predicted a hurricane would strike Orlando because of Disney’s pro-gay policies (it struck Virginia Beach, headquarters of CBN, instead), I am believing that his so-called “prayer offensive” (and I can’t even begin to tell you what’s wrong with that phrase) also will not work.

I am reminded of a cartoon I saw years ago. A preacher stood out in a field, hands raised to heaven, and said, “Lord, if it is your will that I continue in my ministry, send me a sign.” In the next panel, about a million “STOP” signs come crashing down on the preacher’s head. He struggles his way out from underneath them, lifts his hands again, and says, “Any sign will do, Lord . . .”

Literally for God’s sake, Pat Robertson should stop putting God to the test by announcing the expected results of prayer before the prayer has actually happened. That’s just a cynical attempt to force God’s hand, and he’s starting to affect God’s credibility. And if he can’t stop it with the politicized prophesying, then he should do the honorable thing and stop accepting donations. Why throw good money after bad theology?

ROAD SONGS, PART II

Who says we don’t have opposing viewpoints at The Bemusement Park? (Nobody, actually, but please . . . play along with my delusions of popularity!) Today’s road song comes from the Issaquah, WA-based Modest Mouse. I first heard “Convenient Parking” on the legendary Radio K in the Twin Cities. I was immediately drawn in by the insistent, churning, bluesy guitar riff with occasional angular leads. But the lyrics, to me, seem to be about the futility of urban sprawl, a sentiment I share. In fact, the whole song has the monotonous feel of the far-out suburbs . . . strip mall, Wal-Mart, soccer fields, lather, rinse, repeat.

Modest Mouse also has an album called This Is A Long Drive For Someone With Nothing To Think About, unheard by me, but that’s got to be one of the all-time great album titles. The lyrics to “Convenient Parking” are found anon.
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CLAWS EXTENDED

The Des Moines Register (and its chief editorial writer, David Yepsen) are still all over Gov. Tom Vilsack for last week’s acknowledgement that the Gov doesn’t really know how to use e-mail. Yepsen is today implying Vilsack’s national ambitions may be over now:

The charitable view is that he was initially being disingenuous about his digital limitations in order to cover his tracks. No politicians want it known they want to take money from private corporations and their political donors to secretly supplement the salary of a new state economic-development director - a person who can hand development grants back to the very business interests that paid part of his salary.

But if it’s true Vilsack really is electronically challenged, the damage is compounded. The most horrible thing that can happen to a politician is to become a joke. (”Honey, did you see where the governor of Iowa can’t do e-mail?” “Yes, dear, he doesn’t need it to talk to the hogs.”)

Real funny. As a result, any hopes Vilsack has of becoming president or vice president have been damaged by his handling of this. Democrats didn’t get too far with a guy who claimed to invent the Internet, and it’s unlikely they’ll want one who once said he can’t use it at all. Republicans are also chuckling. They know the next time an Iowa Democrat starts thumping President Bush for being a nitwit, they’ll be able to note that Tom Vilsack can’t do e-mail.

One could also wonder what effect this will have on the Iowa caucuses, but I think it will be quite minimal. The best quote on the matter, though, comes from last year’s unsuccessful GOP gubernatorial candidate Doug Gross, in this column from yesterday: “I guess I was overqualified for the job.”